News

Congratulations! We have known you for years as a fabulous jazz musician – but that is only one talent among many. Because you are “not only a jazz musician” at ECM and on various stages, you are not only a singer, instrumentalist, composer, band founder and leader (of Cyminology, Divan of the Continents, Trickster Orchestra …), not only a bridge builder between the Arabic, European and Far Eastern cultural and musical space, between Persian lyricism, vocal melos, refined jazz and new music, but – and you see: How long will sentences that try to describe you in one – but also good for every new discovery: as an actress in our crossover DER MANN DER SICH BEETHOVEN NANNTE or as a presenter in the oper. digital projects, with which we have also drawn the bow to the sciences…. But now that this sentence has come to an end, the next one can only go like this: You wouldn’t be the Cymin we know, appreciate, and love if you didn’t also showcase other talents – perhaps at a music conservatory with a focus on connecting musical styles and cultural practices? In any case: we look forward to what may come after the Jazz Prize!

 Bernhard Glocksin, Artistic Director of the Neuköllner Oper

Foto: © Thomas Koy

The Ukrainian director and author Sashko Brama , with us as a guest in 2016 with “R+J” writes about the current situation:

“My dear friends from abroad, I have received many of your messages and letters. Thank you all for your support, care and willingness to help! Sorry for not answering all at once. The war caught me in Kyiv. On February 24, we woke up early, in the morning, from the explosions. It was the worst morning of my life. We managed to leave Kyiv on the day when the fighting started in the city. I’m fine already. I can already sleep and eat. My relatives and I are now in Lviv (western Ukraine), we are relatively safe here, but my parents are in the occupied territories. Lviv is not bombed, but air-raid sirens often sound here.When I left after the shock, I understood that I had to do my best to resist the evil that came to destroy my world.That’s why I’m staying in Lviv to make documentary video reportages with my friends. We want to talk about the coming to our land evil. We want to talk about the pain that Russia has brought to our home and about the heroism of the Ukrainian people.Today our first report was published on the Polish OKO.press. But we will also make an English version of these materials. If you know the contacts of the Western media, who may be interested in such materials, please contact us.”

Der „weibliche Komponist“ Lili Boulanger musste für ihren Prix de Rome härter kämpfen als so manch männlicher Zeitgenosse. Wie steht es heute um weibliche Vorbilder in der klassischen Musik?

The Neuköllner Oper takes a clear position against Putin’s war of aggression on Ukraine, which violates international law.

We are in solidarity with all people in Ukraine who are exposed to the violent attacks there and are driven out of the country.

And since in these days also and especially the language is changed and manipulated as a tool of political interests, we also support the worldwide call of the International PEN Center.

As a signatory of the Declaration of Die Vielen, we stand up for the freedom of art and culture as well as freedom of expression, which are massively endangered with Putin’s invasion.

If you want to support the local people we recommend you this information of the Tagesspiegel.

The Young NKO is looking for performers, singers, ramp sows between the ages of 16 and 23! Within half a year we will develop a musical theater piece together with you and bring it to the stage. Sometimes we will work with a text and sometimes completely freely – but in any case it will be about you and your stories. You will develop your own texts, create scenes and work on songs. Starting in April we will rehearse once a week and on selected weekends – intensive rehearsal phases are also planned! You don’t need any previous experience – just the desire to be on stage and no fear of crooked sounds.

Sign up by sending a message to Andreas Altenhof.

An overview of the previous plays and projects of the Junge NKO can be found here.

Foto: © Matthias Heyde

News from the oper.digital series: Test yourself now – the composing personality test WELCHER BEETHOVEN BIST DU? is online! On 1.11. the first test results will be presented live by Trickster Orchestra, while the developers of the test app will give insights into the creation of the composing tool. All info about the evening (free admission) can be found here.

Who wants to act, needs dreams. For this we write plays and music. New ones every year, and different ones every year. Our dream remains, it tells of a fair life also for others who have fewer opportunities than us. The future begins now and through us, for a world without climate catastrophes, poverty and injustice. For this it needs a lot of inspiration, music, stories and of course and not least humor.  

So our theme is transformation – in ourselves, in society, economy, culture (institutions). To this end, we have invented eleven plays and series. Some are explicitly about climate change, like the performance series with THE PRESENT and NEW SONGS FROM THE EARTH with the STEGREIF.orchester, activists and initiatives from Berlin and the surrounding area.

Other productions revolve around aspects of change on further levels.

We begin with an incomparable experience under the stars: GIOVANNI.EINE PASSION asked about the possibilities and limits of self-awareness and self-expression. BERLIN KARL-MARX-PLATZ sings the “love song” of a young couple in Neukölln at the beginning of the 90s, when suddenly there was only one system of values and society. DER MANN DER SICH BEETHOVEN NANNTE comes back after two centuries, hears himself again in a completely different musical language and asks questions: about our cultural life and how far we have come with his credo of equality, freedom and justice. EINE STIMME FÜR DEUTSCHLAND plays through oblique positions and motifs of the last election campaign once again in all musical registers, lusty, cheeky and absolutely non-pc. LILI recalls the fascinating work and life of Lili Boulanger – why must such talents die at 24? And why are female composers so little performed to this day? With SCHÖNER WOHNEN Amy Stebbins and Sir Henry perform contemporary and rent-cap-misery-compatible Tiny Apartment. 25 years of vibrant, exemplary collaboration for hands-on education: On the occasion of 25 years of cooperation with the UdK degree program Musical/Show, the team Zaufke & Lund confronts us in PARADISE LOST with the beauties, challenges and dangers of the art form musical. MEXICO AURA connects Berlin with Mexico and a globalized, post(?)colonial world in an international MusikTanzTheater at the Humboldt Forum. A play around art objects, myths and everyday reality between prehispanic sounds and modern sounds of the young composer Diana Syrse. 

Three program series spanning and deepening the season play selected venues as new stages in the city: the finalist production of comPOSITION, our BERLINER OPERNPREIS, invites you to the Kulturstall Britz, including a supporting program. The new cooperation with the vocal ensemble THE PRESENT creates performative programs on climate change at different locations. Our WUNDERKAMMER-series – where music and current science combine to create a different view of the world – invites curious audiences to special “resonance spaces,” including the Prinzessinnengarten Neukölln, the Altes Museum in Mitte, and the Oriental Garden in Marzahn.

Photo: Maya Alban-Zapata and Christian Kerepeszki in Der Mann der sich Beethoven nannte | © Matthias Heyde

Congratulations! This award sets an example: Ulrike Schwab receives the MORTIER NEXT GENERATION award. No prize focuses so clearly on the vision of a different, perhaps new music theater as this internationally renowned award in memory of the great music theater mastermind and enabler Gerald Mortier. What a compelling choice!

… and we have ours too!  In Hohenpfaffenberg-Siegertsbrunn, the provincial small town from Eine Stimme für Deutschland, we follow the fierce fight of the Green Party’s Regula Hartmann-Hagenbeck against Alina Deutschmann, the top candidate of the local New Right.

A year (almost) without theater. No acting, no singing, no dancing, no music. Silence in front of, on and behind the stage. Because culture is not a nice accessory in our society, but a staple, the Friends of the Berlin Theaters have started the initiative #kulturhungrig: All friends and the audience of the theaters, opera houses and concert halls to call, write, perform, and beam the expression of their anticipation of an imminent opening to the world …

We had a dream, it was small and modest, we thought… It was about affordable rents and the right to live. That dream seemed at least within reach in 2020, the year Felix Krakau and Yuval Halpern’s real estate infotainment OPERA FOR SALE premiered: “As of February 2020, rents for about 1.5 million […] apartments were frozen at June 2019 levels. Rents that were more than 20 percent above the ceilings [were] prohibited by law.” (Berliner Morgenpost, 16.4.21) Now the rent cap has been overturned by the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe, tenants* face great uncertainties – and we all face the next round in the concrete gold monopoly.